Analysis: Interface – The sustainability red carpet

Global carpet-tile maker Interface is seeing the benefits of drastically cutting the environmental impacts of its European operations

Interface is at it again. The carpet-tile manufacturer, famed for being a green business pioneer, says it has achieved a number of “major sustainability milestones” by virtually eradicating some of the main environmental impacts from its continental European operations.

At its Scherpenzeel plant in the Netherlands, energy is now 100% renewable, water has been “virtually” eliminated from manufacturing processes, and zero waste is sent to landfill, according to Interface. In Europe overall, since 1996, the company has cut greenhouse gas emissions by 90% and water use by 95%. Innovations at Scherpenzeel include a switch to biogas (produced from rotting fish) and recirculation of water.

Interface, which was founded in the US, has seven manufacturing locations across the globe, and the company says its Netherlands achievements cannot necessarily be reproduced at its other sites, which will have “their own strategies”. However, progress at Scherpenzeel is a vindication of the Mission Zero vision of Interface’s founder, Ray Anderson.

Although Anderson died in 2011, Interface remains committed to becoming, by 2020, “the first company to be fully sustainable, and ultimately to become a restorative business”, an Interface spokeswoman tells Ethical Corporation.

Model approach

Interface is following the logic of the “new industrial model”. A recent report...

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